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Harris, Biden blast incompetent Don, lay out vision for a decent America
He-e-e-re’s Kamala!
Joe Biden’s newly minted vice presidential running mate ripped President Trump and paid tribute to Black Lives Matters protesters in a soaring kickoff to the homestretch of the November presidential campaign.
“The case against Donald Trump and Mike Pence is open and shut,” said Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.). “This is what happens when we elect someone who is just not up for the job.”
She ticked off what she said are Trump’s top failures: not containing the coronavirus pandemic, not stopping the economic meltdown, and the inability to bring the racially divided nation together.
“In just 83 days we have a chance to choose a better future for America,” Harris said. “It’s all on the line.”
The daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, she is the first Black woman and first person of South Asian descent to join a major party presidential ticket, and she spoke passionately about her own identity as a multicultural child of the civil rights movement in the 1960s.
“My mother raised my sister and me, that it was up to every generation of Americans to keep on marching,” she said.
Harris, 55, praised the millions of Americans who have taken to the streets in protests for racial justice as a “coalition of conscience.”
“You are my heroes,” she said.
Biden, 77, is betting that Harris’s inspirational persona, eloquence and bareknuckled style will boost his push to oust Trump.
“This morning, all across the nation, little girls woke up — especially little Black and Brown girls, who so often feel overlooked and undervalued in their communities. But today, today, just maybe, they’re seeing themselves for the first time in a new way,” Biden said.
The one-time primary rivals spoke in a high school gym in Biden’s Delaware hometown to discuss their shared vision for how to defeat Trump as the nation
grapples with the raging coronavirus pandemic and national protests against racism.
The ex-vice president introduced Harris as his pick to be the “last person in the room” before any key decisions, just like Biden was as President Barack Obama’s lieutenant for eight years.
“Kamala is a proven fighter for our country and our middle class,” he added.
“She knows how to make the hard calls. She’s ready to do this job on day one.”
Biden drew an inspiring parallel between his own working-class roots in Scranton, Pa., and her polyglot upbringing as the daughter of immigrants in the San Francisco Bay Area.
“It’s a great day for America,” Biden said. “Her story is America’s story.”
Biden and Harris, along with their spouses and top aides, sent a unified message by wearing face masks in an effort to cut a sharp contrast with Trump’s stubborn resistance to setting an example amid the pandemic.
Both leaders spoke about the third anniversary of the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., in which a social justice protester was killed.
Biden said he decided to run for president after Trump infamously said there were “very fine people on both sides” in Charlottesville.
“No president has ever said anything like that before,” said Biden.
The Biden campaign plans a rollout that blends the history-making nature of the Harris selection with the realities of the 2020 campaign and the gravity of the nation’s circumstances.
While the former California attorney general has been a regular surrogate campaigner and fund-raiser since Biden became the presumptive nominee, the duo will still need to paper over differences exposed during the primary campaign, especially Harris’ deeply personal debate broadside against Biden over his opposition to federally mandated busing to integrate public schools in the 1970s.
Biden is betting that Harris has broad appeal that will shore up weaknesses with Black women, an anchor of the Democratic Party, and other voters of color, while boosting turnout among white liberals.
Karen Finney, a prominent Black strategist in the Democratic Party, pointed to immediate fund-raising success as evidence that Harris will give Biden a big push.
Act Blue, the Democrats’ online fund-raising arm, reported taking in almost $11 million in the hours after Biden’s announcement, and the Biden campaign expects a massive haul from Wednesday evening’s grassroots fund-raiser.
The ticket, Finney said, “makes clear that Biden is serious about having people who like the diversity of our country and our future at the highest decision-making tables. That gives people hope.”